In certain settings, it is necessary to initiate a request for assistance that is automatically distributed to an appropriate individual. Systems are in use that are able to receive event messages from one or more event generation devices, process the event message to identify which of one or more individuals should receive a message alerting them to the event occurrence, and to transmit an alert message to the identified individual(s) in an appropriate format. These systems are typically referred to as Event Notification Systems (ENS), and they can be useful in healthcare settings, emergency management settings, retail or commercial settings, and in many other settings. For the purposes of this description, an ENS will be described in the context of a healthcare setting.
FIG. 1 is a diagram illustrating a healthcare network 100 that comprises an Event Generation Device (EGD) 110 and an Event Notification System 120 (ENS) connected over a network to a healthcare server 115. The EGD 110 can be in communication via a wired or wireless network link with the server 115, and the ENS 120 can be in communication with an alert message recipient (AMR) 130 over a wired or wireless link. In a hospital setting the AMR 130 can be any member of a hospital staff, such as a doctor, a nurse or other caregiver. In a hospital setting, the EGD 110 can be, among other things, a piece of equipment such as a heartbeat, blood pressure, temperature, blood oxygen, or respiration monitor. It can be a communication device located in an emergency department bay or intensive care unit operated by staff for the purpose of requesting supplies or other staff, or it can be a nurse station. Each EGD 110 can generate and transmit event messages that comprise the identity of the originating device, the time the message is transmitted and information particular to the purpose of the alert message, such as a request for supplies, a request for a staff member, or clinical information such as an indication that a particular patient's heart has stopped. Each different type of event can be identified by a code that is standard to the environment in which the device is operating. The ENS 120 generally operates to, among other things, receive event messages and to examine their contents to determine which particular device sent the message and to determine which recipient or recipients an alert message should be forwarded to. In a healthcare or other setting, it is often important to identify and to alert a caregiver or caregivers closest to the source of an event of the event's occurrence to provide prompt responses. FIG. 2 is a diagram of a healthcare network 200 having functionality that operates to receive information from either or both of a patient monitor 201 and some other type of event generation device 202, such as the EGD in FIG. 1, and to receive real-time location information from a real-time location (RTL) system 210 all for the purpose of determining the proximity of a caregiver to the source of a clinical event associated with a particular patient.
The healthcare network 200 of FIG. 2 can be implemented in one or more computer servers 205 or other type of computational device which is capable of communicating with a network (local or wide-area network) and is configured to include some or all of the functionality comprising the healthcare network 100 described earlier with reference to FIG. 1. Additionally, the network 200 also comprises an RTL system 210 in communication with a plurality of tag detection devices 220. Each of the RTL tag detectors can operate to receive signals from any of a plurality of wireless RTL tags 230, that can be attached to an individual or to a piece of equipment, and to transmit information (tag ID for instance) in the signals received from a tag over a network link to the RTL system 210. The tag detection device 220, or simply detector 220, can be strategically positioned to detect the presence of a tag 230 within range of the detector in some or all of a plurality of specified facility locations. These locations can correspond to particular buildings, floors, hallways, rooms or other specified locations in a particular facility. The RTL system 210 is also comprised of a listing of tag identities 215 and a listing of tag detector locations 225, wherein the tag identity 215 can be unique coded information specified by a system administrator, and each tag detector location 225 can correspond to an actual, physical location within a building, such as a particular floor, a hallway, a room, etc. The tag detector locations 225 can be stored in any suitable non-volatile memory (not shown) comprising the healthcare network 200. The RTL system 210 can be designed to operate with either active or passive location tags. In the case where the system is operating with passive tags, the system includes a transceiver that periodically sends out a signal that activates circuitry in the passive tag causing it to transmit tag information (typically a tag ID) back to the system 210. In the case of active tags, each tag includes a battery to power transmitter circuitry that operates to periodically transmit a signal that includes, among other things, the identity of that tag. In operation, a tag worn by a staff member or attached to a piece of mobile medical equipment comes into range of a tag detector 220 which detects the presence and identity of the tag and transmits the tag ID and detector location ID to the RTL system 210, which then stores the current tag location and the time of detection in non-volatile memory associated with the healthcare network 200 for later use.
In addition to the RTL system 210 described with reference to FIG. 2, the network 200 also comprises an event notification system (ENS) 240 similar to the system 120 described earlier with reference to FIG. 1. In addition to the functionality comprising the ENS 120, ENS 240 can have proximity notification functionality 250 that operates to detect one or more appropriate staff members closest to the source of an event, and to notify the one or more identified staff members of the event and the location of the event.